


Substitute

by VicTheSpookyGoat



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, Consensual Sex, Dark fic, F/M, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, One Shot, Patch 2.0: A Realm Reborn Spoilers, maybe an AU? idk man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:01:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27050854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VicTheSpookyGoat/pseuds/VicTheSpookyGoat
Summary: One-shot, may or may not be canon, exploring Moni's complicated relationship with Ilberd Feare. Started as a random headcanon and spiraled wildly out of control. I’m so sorry.
Relationships: Ilberd Feare/Warrior of Light
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	Substitute

It started as an itch; a nagging sensation at the back of her mind, easy to ignore in the chaos of her days, but growing incessant and demanding in the rare quiet moments she had to herself once the sun had set. 

For moons, she managed to resist the temptation to scratch it; easy enough at first, since the thing that would well and truly salve the itch was beyond her grasp, and ought to stay that way if she knew what was good for her… After a while, she tried to pacify it, to quiet it with nimble fingers and an imagination allowed to wander, if only for fleeting, secret moments, to rough hands and bronzed muscles and a touch that shouldn’t have been as gentle as it was… but all that accomplished was making the itch _worse_ ; more incessant, more demanding.

Which was why she now found herself standing in front of a door to quarters that were not her own, a bottle of whiskey in one hand and the other poised with knuckles hovering just over the smooth wood, and wondering what the seven hells she was thinking… if she was thinking at all…

He’d made his interest clear from the outset; not in words, but in glances that lingered just past the edge of propriety, in flimsy excuses to place himself in her vicinity when duty offered no other reason for his presence… And if she was being honest with herself, there was something about this that made her feel a way that she had not since before the Calamity. Desired. Desirable. There had been a time when that feeling was something to take for granted, just a part of the job… but now…

She let her knuckles fall sharply against the wood, once, twice, before dropping her hand to her side and waiting for some response. For a moment, she considered ripping the cork from the bottle and upending its contents down her throat, but then the door opened, and any space for further consideration of just what the hells she was doing dissolved as she closed the gap and crashed her lips to his without another thought.

Ilberd was _not_ the next best thing. If she were ranking the things she desired, he likely would not have even warranted inclusion on the list. He was too smooth, too _smarmy_ and eager to ingratiate his way into her trust in a way that set her hackles up, reminded her the flesh merchants of her youth… 

But he was here, and there were no political implications in shoving her tongue down his throat and her hand down his pants. There were no alliances to consider as she stroked him to hardness; no allies to endanger as his fingers slipped between her thighs and curled into her. No real risk in letting him bend her over the rickety table and yank her smalls to the side and shove himself into her. No danger of getting attached as he grunted and rutted and maybe even thought he could fill that aching void. Certainly no harm could come from letting him spill on her thighs with a ragged sigh, or letting him linger over her for moments too long as he caught his breath. 

She didn’t kiss him afterward, and he didn’t try to kiss her, maybe sensing that whatever this was, it wasn’t out of affection and it definitely wasn’t love. Maybe he knew he was just a substitute. He had to know. Perhaps that was cruel, or perhaps it was a kindness; but she couldn’t find it in her to care either way. He had served his purpose; he’d scratched the itch, answered its demands, at least for a moment, and that was all this was, all it could ever be.

That’s what she would tell herself, the next time, and that time after that. And for a time, it was enough to mindlessly let him scratch her itch without affection or gentleness, because she could understand that, could make sense of it, could accept it for what it was.

But the itch didn’t go away. Ilberd could only scratch the surface; he would never be able to sooth its cause, because he _wasn’t_ its cause. But it had to be enough. Because that was all that she could let herself have.

*****

Maybe that was why, when he had her with her hands bound and her fate in his, he sent the others away. Maybe that was why he threw her to her knees and slammed her face into the stone floor hard enough to bruise. Maybe that was why, after he finished inside her and smeared his wretched seed over the angry welts he’d left on her thighs, she couldn’t find in herself to be angry. Why she couldn’t grasp onto that old familiar rage; because maybe she had brought this on herself.

He knew he was just a substitute. He knew who he was a substitute for, and he made sure she knew it, and he made sure that the man he was replacing knew it. He used this knowledge just as brutally as he’d used that broadsword, but instead of wielding it in a wide arch of steel and blood, he fashioned it into a concealed dagger, one more flash of cruelty to twist until it broke off between Raubahn’s ribs as he bled out at his feet.

Only then, only when he hissed those insinuations, salt in a gaping wound, making a mockery of his rival’s manhood with the knowledge that _he_ had taken what Raubahn wanted, just as remorselessly as he had taken his arm… Only then did she find her anger. 

It wasn’t the bruises on her thighs or the lingering ache in her core that found purchase on that old familiar rage. It was the look on Raubahn’s face; the confusion and the hurt, the fury that wasn’t for his own suffering, that stoked the fire in her chest and goaded her to her feet. It was the anguish in his eyes that propelled her as she tried to charge at that bastard, and the anger in his voice as the back of a gloved hand caught her across the mouth and sent her careening to the floor again that drew a snarl from her throat. It was the sight of him, maimed and haunted, putting himself between her and the man who had been his pathetic substitute, that put a violent promise in her mouth as the Scions drug her away to safety. 

And it was that cold, mirthless grin she got in return that kept that fire burning, until the day that fucking bastard threw himself off that fucking wall and robbed her of the chance to keep that promise. After that it didn’t matter. There was no justice in it. No satisfaction, save for the knowledge that she was alive and he wasn’t, but that was barely a comfort, for wasn’t that what he had wanted all along?

At least she would never accept another substitute. 

That’s what she told herself, because she had to believe that something good had come out of knocking on that bastard’s door. 


End file.
